Dancing Cheek to Cheek
by Jessica314
Summary: A little Valentine's Day fluff for you all! This one-shot is set during Edward and Bella's wedding reception in Breaking Dawn. It's a companion to a couple of themes in my Tale of Years Series, but it can easily be read alone.


**This is set during Edward and Bella's wedding reception. The book doesn't leave many opportunities for a gapfiller there, so let's say it happens during their third round of dancing- this is after the Jacob incident has blown over and before Alice comes up to remind them it's time to leave for the airport. **

**This goes along with the "Dancing Cheek to Cheek" scenes in 1935 and with the "Isabella Swan" chapter of 1950, as well as the diamond heart theme in the chapters following that one. Thank you to IAmSupergirl2 and Tata B-P for their ideas here. Enjoy the fluff :) **

**Disclaimer: The Twilight Saga and its universe are the property of Stephenie Meyer. No profit is made here and no offense intended.**

"When Edward claimed me again, I found that the Jacob-drawer was shut nice and tight. As he wrapped his arms around me, I was able to unearth my earlier sense of joy, my certainty that everything in my life was in the right place tonight." _Breaking Dawn, _Chapter 4

* * *

**Bella POV**

I laid my head against Edward's chest and we began to twirl again, more slowly this time. We weren't quite as picture-perfect as we had been earlier; Emmett had messed up my hair a bit, and at some point Edward's bow tie had come undone. His hair had finally broken free of whatever Alice had done to tame it, and was wild once again. My upper arms were still throbbing from Jacob's bruising grip, and my feet were _killing_ me. It only took Edward a moment to notice.

"Do you want to rest?" he asked, slowing our dance and glancing towards an empty chair.

"No way. There'll be plenty of time for that later. Um, on the plane, I mean…" My blush came on cue, and Edward chuckled quietly. He released me and went down on one knee.

"Are you proposing again?" I gulped. He shook his head, smirking down at my feet. I felt his cold hands then, and let him slip off the torture implements that Alice called shoes. As he stood, he gently picked me up and set my feet on top of his shoes.

"Better?"

"Much."

We began swaying again, and my eyes closed against his suit jacket. But the music stopped abruptly, and I opened my eyes to see Rosalie walking away from the DJ. She looked over toward us with a small smile, then joined Emmett back on the dance floor.

"Sometimes she can be positively decent," Edward mused, watching them. The music started up, then: a scratchy, old –fashioned recording. It was _Dancing Cheek to Cheek_, one of Renee's favorites. I had never heard it played this slowly before. Edward bent his head down until his cold cheek met my warm one. I felt his eyes close. He sighed deeply, his arms tightening around me as we began to dance again.

"I guess you guys really appreciate the oldies, don't you?"

He laughed into my hair. "This one's a bit older than that. It came out in '35…" He straightened up again, watching Rosalie and Emmett as they floated by. Rosalie caught his eye again, and he nodded to her slightly. "Rosalie and I danced this together, that year, at a banquet. She was feeling particularly sorry for herself that night, and hating how she would never get to have a normal life… how she would probably never find love. Wishing she could find it."

I tried to wrap my head around it: Edward and Rosalie, the two most gorgeous people in the whole world, dancing together before my grandparents were even born. Even in my head, they looked perfect together-perfect, sparkling, and single. I remembered what Edward had told me once: that when Carlisle had changed Rosalie, he was hoping that she could become to Edward was Esme was to him. What had he and Esme been thinking that night, as they watched Edward and Rosalie dancing? I wasn't sure I wanted to know.

"This song was the last dance that night," he continued. "We didn't want to dance it with each other, but we were already out on the dance floor. It was… sad. But then, mere weeks later, she found Emmett. Things were better after that. I played this song for them, at their wedding. The first one, I mean," he added with a smirk.

"And now she's returning the favor?"

"Yes."

He lowered his face to touch mine again, and the lights miraculously dimmed as our dancing slowed even further. I peeked over his shoulder at Rosalie and mouthed _thank you_. I half expected her to roll her eyes and look away. But she smiled back, just before closing her eyes and leaning into Emmett's shoulder again.

It was one of those moments when I felt like a little kid, compared to Edward and the rest of them. They had so many decades of history, secrets, and memories together. Things as supernatural as cleaning up after their "accidents", and things as normal as a brother and sister awkwardly dancing a love song together.

"What about you?" I blurted out.

"Hmm?"

Edward's cheek on mine grew suddenly colder: a sure sign I was blushing again. "Were you… wishing too? That you would find love?"

We danced in silence for a moment. "Yes," he said finally, "though it wasn't nearly as difficult for me, as for her. Not then, at any rate. That wasn't something I was looking for around the time of my change. And by that point, I had already grown accustomed to being alone. I told myself, as often as I needed to, that I was complete in and of myself. And in the vampire world, there aren't many… ah, prospects."

I heard a delicate sigh from across the dance floor. It sounded an awful lot like Tanya. Edward's smile twitched at the corners. "Some days were easier than others," he continued. "I always hoped I would find you, on my more optimistic days. Other times I was more cynical, thinking that I simply didn't deserve it, or that the odds were that it was never going to happen. But watching Rosalie and Emmett fall in love was really the first time that it _bothered_ me that I was alone."

"Not when Carlisle and Esme fell in love?"

"That was different," he said softly. We both turned to watch them; it seemed that they had been dancing, but had frozen mid-step and were simply staring into one another's eyes. "Carlisle was already my father in nearly every way. And from the moment she woke up, Esme was determined to be the mother that I needed. So when they fell in love… or more accurately, when they _finished_ falling in love, since they had met years before, it was like watching my parents find each other. But Rosalie was my sister… my equal. And since we weren't interested in each other, it was conceivable that we would be spending eternity next to each other, both alone. And even though we didn't always get along, at least we _had_ each other, in a way.

"But then she found Emmett, a mere two years into her new life. I think that was the part that bothered me the most- how briefly she had to wait. I was… jealous of that. But it was my new reality, living with two happy couples. I got used to it."

"At least you didn't have to watch Alice and Jasper fall in love," I offered.

"No… but they were the worst, in a way. Jasper didn't have as much control over his gift back then as he does now. Sometimes, when he was feeling a particularly strong emotion, it would spill over onto the rest of us. And so I finally had an actual _taste_ of what it was like to be in love- only an echo of the real thing, mind you, but it was still quite a revelation for me. And their wedding day was particularly difficult, in a way that the others hadn't been. Jasper was absolutely giddy, and-"

I snorted into his shoulder. "Jasper? _Giddy_? No way."

"You'd be surprised," Edward muttered.

I stole a peek over to Alice and Jasper- they were sitting at one of the tables with Charlie. Jasper seemed to be in the middle of telling a story, but he turned slightly toward me as he continued to speak to Charlie. He shot me a crooked smile- though it was different than Edward's somehow- and _winked_.

"That day was probably the worst," Edward continued in a faraway voice. "I had felt so much from Jasper, and seen so much love in all those around me… I had never felt so much emptiness before, felt so keenly the absence of… of _you_. And then it occurred to me that Alice had seen all of us years before, even Emmett and Rosalie, who hadn't been changed yet… I thought she might be able to see something, a clue of when I might meet my other half, if I had one."

"And?"

Edward's hand trailed softly down my arm. His fingers tangled in my bracelet, touching the heart crystal. His eyes darkened a bit, and for a moment I thought it was because of the wolf charm which was hanging opposite of the heart. S_tupid_, I thought fiercely. I should have put the heart by itself on a necklace, or something like that, for the wedding. But Edward's fingers gently cradled the heart, his thumb rubbing over it.

The music changed then, and the lights grew dimmer. This time it was Alice leaning down to talk to the DJ. The new song was a simple piano recording- Edward playing my lullaby.

"And she found nothing," he said flatly. "She even looked ahead, as far as she could- though that rarely brings up anything much, anyway. I hadn't realized until that moment how hopeful I had been, how I had felt that I was waiting for an event that might actually happen. But when Alice found no evidence of ever having another sister, when she had so clearly seen Rosalie, and all the rest of us… it was a bigger blow than I had expected."

He let go of the heart crystal suddenly, and met my eyes with a guilty look, as though he were confessing some sort of crime. "I… lost faith after that. I decided it was better to feel nothing, rather than emptiness. I told myself, from that day forward, that it simply wasn't going to happen- or that if it did, it was centuries down the road. You see, in all my daydreams, you were never _human_, Bella. My other half was always going to be a vampire, because I would never commit the unpardonable act of taking away a young woman's life, simply to satisfy my own desire. Carlisle and Rosalie had both found their mates while they were still human- but that was different. Both Esme and Emmett were moments away from death when Carlisle changed them. Pure chance, in both cases, and in neither case did Carlisle or Rosalie have any inkling of the love that was about to envelop them. I had always assumed my… love story… would be more like Alice's; finding someone who had walked the earth at least as long as I had. I naturally assumed that she wasn't going to be a vegetarian when I found her, that I was going to teach her our ways." He finally smiled again. "Love at first sight, and of course I would instantly be drawn in by the melodious sound of her thoughts."

"Of course," I said dreamily. "It's a wonderful story."

"It was all I had. So when Alice couldn't find you, even that was lost. I convinced myself, over time, that I simply was meant to be alone. I had suspected it before, on my more cynical days, but now it became a sort of harsh reality. It was easier than hoping. I stopped composing for you, soon after that. My inspiration was gone, and it hurt too much to try and stir it again."

I frowned, looking back at the DJ again. I noticed, with a self-conscious jolt, that the dance floor had somehow emptied. We were dancing alone to my lullaby now, and everyone else was either watching us from the edges or chattering to one another quietly. "What do you mean, composing? I thought you wrote the lullaby _after_ you met me."

Edward finally grinned, a smile that reached his eyes and made the years fall away. He pulled away from me and lifted my arm higher, turning me into a delicate, slow-motion spin. When we came back together, his arms came around me like a vice. "You have no idea, Mrs. Cullen, how many songs I've written for you," he whispered in my ear. "And there will be many more."

I suddenly felt warm from head to toe, as I heard the promise in his whisper. He was promising that there was still so much for us to learn about each other, and he was reminding me that he had agreed to give me eternity, so that we _could_ learn those things. That I was worthy to join the centuries-long story of this amazing family. That even though I had ended up being nothing like the mate he had tentatively hoped for once upon a time, that I was all he wanted now.

"I wish I could have waited for you, too," I murmured. "It's not fair. And my thoughts are so _un_melodious that you can't even hear them."

He grinned again, letting his hand drift back down to touch the heart crystal on my wrist. With his other arm, he lifted me back up onto his shoes, and laid his cold cheek on mine again.

"You're not exactly what I expected," he laughed, brushing a kiss against my hair. "You're more, Bella... far more than I could ever have thought to hope for."


End file.
